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Viola Livingstone 


OR 

WHAT’S IN A NAME? 


BY / 

MARY E. PAYNE 


THE 

Bbbcy press 

PUBLISHERS 

114 

FIFTH AVENUE 

Condon NEW YORK TOontroal 




THE LIBRARY OF 
CONGRESS, 
Two Coptts Received 

MAY. 21 1901 

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CONTENTS, 


CXAPTXK PAGE 

I. Lord Sinclair 7 

II. At the Seashore 14 

III, Viola at Home 21 

IV. At the Opera 27 

V. Viola Takes Flight 30 

VI, Uncle Walter and Aunt Meta 34 

VII. Viola Turns Artist 38 

VIII. Aunt Meta as a Mother 42 

IX. Mrs. Livingstone Plans to Find Viola... 48 

X. An Unpleasant Meeting 52 

XI. Mrs. Livingstone Offers Consolation 60 

XII. Viola Develops Rare Traits of Character. 65 

XIII, Lord Sinclair and Mrs. Livingstone Get 

Back to New York 68 

XIV. The Minister Falls in Love 73 

XV. The Trio Set Sail for Europe 79 

XVI. Is Music Her Forte? 83 

XVII, Viola’s Flight Discovered 89 

XVIII. Mrs. Livingstone and Sinclair Follow Viola. 94 

XIX. Viola Confesses Her Love 102 

XX. Viola’s Wedding 105 


VIOLA LIVINGSTONE. 


CHAPTER I. 

LORD SINCLAIR. 

New York City abounds in beautiful 
women. You cannot walk a square without 
encountering one or more of them. 

To be sure, some are of a more exalted type 
than others, with a regal air and queenly bear- 
ing, that make them the superior of other 
women, physically, mentally and morally. 

Viola Livingstone belonged to the latter class 
— a lovely creature, born to sway the destinies 
of others by her womanliness and innate good- 
tiess of heart. 

Her hair was so golden that the very rays of 
sunshine seemed to pale before it, eyes as blue 


8 Viola Livingstone. 

and true as the heavens, skin as white as ala- 
baster, and cheeks as red as twin roses. Add 
to this perfection of form and feature, and do 
you wonder that people turned around to take 
a second glance at the lovely face and figure? 

Her mother had watched over this beautiful 
creature until she had come to perfection, then 
naturally looked around to secure for her a 
suitable husband. That her daughter would be 
unequally yoked was something she could 
never for a moment think of. 

At last her eye lit upon Lord Sinclair. He 
must surely be the completion of her daughter’s 
being. He was a pompous man. If greatness 
consists in size. Lord Sinclair was a great man. 
Of one of the oldest families in Europe, he was 
said to be a lineal descendant of kings and 
queens. 

But Lord Sinclair must live his own life and 
eke out his own fate. He came, saw, con- 
quered, was the opinion of the world. 

But, alas ! Viola did not wear her heart upon 
her sleeve. 

Her mother and lover attributed it to her 


Lord Sinclair. 


9 


modesty if she was a little quiet or self-pos-* 
sessed. 

Viola possessed a vast fortune in her own 
right. Was this the golden bait that attracted 
Lord Sinclair? 

Certain it was, as she was nearing her ma- 
jority, and about to come into possession of it, 
he redoubled his attentions to her. 

He presented her with mammoth bouquets 
of her favorite flowers, fresh with the dews of 
nature. Ah ! if he could have seen how much 
more beautiful Viola w^as when she was nat- 
ural, would he have wanted to substitute any- 
thing artificial in heart or mind ? 

Naturally she was straightforward, truthful, 
open, but if she now resorted to any little sub- 
terfuges or stratagems it was because she could 
not adapt herself to circumstances as many an- 
other person might have done. 

Lord Sinclair was good looking, command- 
ing in person. Always sure of the mastery in 
every undertaking in life, he did not expect to 
be daunted in this. Her beauty dazzled him 
as the sun dazzles the eye, but he meant to get 


lo Viola Livingstone. 

possession of it, as the astronomer means fin- 
ally to know all the ins and outs of that vol- 
canic world. 

‘‘Women are always fond of titles,’^ said he. 
“Give them a title or high sounding name and 
they will let go of everything else, and I am 
sure Viola is no exception.’’ 

He brought rich carriages to take her to the 
theatre, but after all this display she could not 
but think his invitations were threadbare, and 
that money wanted was written all over his 
clothing and equipages. Her mother seemed 
more delighted than any one else with these 
invitations. 

“My dear,” she said to Viola, “I want you 
to treat Lord Sinclair with the greatest re- 
spect and deference; he is the greatest catch 
of the season.” 

“If so,” thought Viola, “what small fry there 
must be in the social waters.” 

But Viola went with him because her mother 
ordered it, and if outward signs are any indi- 
cation her mother will win the game and make 
Viola his wife, if in name only. 


Lord Sinclair. 


1 1 

Lord Sinclair had come over from England 
to “do” the continent, till the beauty of Viola 
had acted like a loadstone, and he was riveted 
to the spot. 

“Madamoiselle is so lovely,” said he, “I 
cannot leave her to see the great charms of 
nature.” 

He plied his art of love making well. He 
praised her music, her painting, her drawing. 
Indeed he was sure mademoiselle would have 
made an artist if she had been born in the old 
country, she had such an eye for the beautiful, 
and with the teaching of some of the old mas- 
ters would have shone in the galleries of fame. 

He is so polished, so refined, so gentlemanly, 
perhaps after all he is a genuine gem, and not 
an imitation. It is hard sometimes to tell one 
from the other. At any rate, it is always 
pleasanter to think we are in possession of the 
genuine, and we will think so of him unless 
he should prove himself to the contrary. 

So Lord Sinclair made love, and if Viola’s 
heart did not beat time to it, he was none 
the wiser. He thought she was the shyest little 


12 Viola Livingstone. 

rosebud that he had ever come across, and if 
she blushed and hid her head away he was 
all the more flattered. He did not know that 
she was trying to hide away from him, lest by 
some means, fair or foul, he might, unfore- 
seen, pluck her from the parent stem. 

Alas! we often admire the loveliness of 
something without thinking whether we are 
worthy to come into possession of it or not. 

So it was with Sinclair. Viola lived in an- 
other world from him, so to speak; in an in- 
tellectual atmosphere to which he had never 
attained. His physical nature was as much as 
he could attend to ; his suppers, his wines, his 
cigars, his fashionable attire, his pleasure at 
theatre and opera was enough for one person 
to attend to. 

Yet when he was in one of his more spiritual 
moods he would have given worlds to have 
shaken off the dross, and soar in the pure ele- 
ment where Viola basked in the smiles of 
heaven. 

Ah! if he had but known. Love is some- 
thing that cannot grow in low places. It needs 


Lord Sinclair. 


13 


something high and elevating for it to take 
root. So to make love to Viola he would have 
to go up where she was, for he could never 
bring her down to his level. 


14 


Viola Livingstone. 


CHAPTER 11. 

AT THE SEASHORE. 

Summer came around with its trailing robe 
of emeralds, and scent of flowers. All nature 
seemed in for a frolic, from bird and bee down 
to the tiniest insects that crawl. 

Happiness is something that seems to per- 
vade the summer air. The clouds seem but 
the drapery of heaven swung out to the pure 
breeze. 

The earth had awakened from its dormant 
sleep of winter, and clothed itself anew. The 
waterfall and cataract seemed to bring new 
life in their train. The golden air is saturated 
with the perfume of myriads of flowers that 
are arranged as artistically as any artist could 
do. 


At the Seashore. 


15 

What a place for lovers young dream to be 
realized. 

But the chief attraction seems to be at the 
seashore, perhaps because old ocean never tires 
singing its love songs. 

It was decided that Viola should go to the 
seashore, and Lord Sinclair had gained per- 
mission to accompany her. 

*"It will look so pious like to have a lord 
with us,’’ said the mother, '‘and I never like to 
have Viola unaccompanied by one of the male 
sex. It gives a chance for strangers to force 
themselves upon you, whether you want them 
or not.” 

Sinclair was in the swim nearly all the time, 
if he was not in the water. His name was 
floating in all the country newspapers as the 
great Lord Berkley Sinclair, of London, Eng- 
land. 

But a prophet is not without honor, save in 
his own country, and in his own house, and 
so perhaps it is with a lord. 

Newport was one of the most fashionable 
resorts of the day, and thither they went. 


1 6 Viola Livingstone. 

Now it was crowded with the ultra-fashion- 
able set from New York and the surrounding 
cities, and Mrs. Livingstone’s in her element. 

To move in the upper strata, surrounded by 
the Hite was all she asked for. To see and be 
seen, idolized, admired, she seemed to forget 
everything but self, and the roseate prospects 
of Viola. Love was to her an unknown lan- 
guage. She basked in society’s smile and was 
content to be society’s queen. 

Alas! how many of the rich go down to 
the seashore to wash off the veneer of fash- 
ionable society, to get rid of the canker of dis- 
content, to bask in the waves with the com- 
moner, forgetful for the time being of the dif- 
ference in station. 

Its broad breast is spread out before you 
like a sea of polished gold, as the sun glints 
over it. 

Viola loved to watch it, hoping she might 
see from this vast mirror some bright picture 
of her future reflected. She loved old ocean, 
and would it give back love for love? 

As the sun shines on it it seems to be cov- 


At the Seashore. 


17 


ered with innumerable jewels, that sparkle and 
glitter, as if the Great Author had spread out 
all of his treasures there for the eye to feast 
upon. 

Viola was more lovely than ever in these 
days. 

'‘See how much in love she is,'' says her 
mother; "she does not seem to notice her 
would-be-admirers. I knew it would be that 
way when Lord Sinclair decided to accompany 
us." 

There is nothing like good company to keep 
away bad, and the mother rouged her cheeks 
and an added sparkle seemed to shine in her 
eye. 

You would think that she was fixing up for 
Sinclair herself, and it must be said that she 
had to do a good deal of the courting. To see 
her daughter "fixed" in society's upper king- 
dom, a lady of high rank, moving among 
peers and dukes, was her highest aim and pur- 
pose. Surely love would grow among such 
surroundings. 

Not so thought Viola. Her very heart 


1 8 Viola Livingstone. 

strings might break, but she would never yield 
one iota to her mother’s capitulations. She re- 
joiced in her freedom like bird or butterfly, 
and would never be taken captive while she 
could elude her pursuers. If it came to the 
worst she would run away. She had an uncle 
and aunt living in another State, and they 
would gladly welcome her. 

During her childhood their families had ex- 
changed visits, and Viola remembered them 
with the greatest affection. 

Uncle Walter, her father’s brother, was a 
fine specimen of a country gentleman; tall, 
broad shouldered, well proportioned, he was, 
as she remembered him, her ideal of a man. 

Lord Sinclair was too dumpy, too broad, 
without proportionate height. 

Aunt Meta had a lovely face, soft and gentle, 
with dimples in cheeks and chin, and hair al- 
most golden as her own. 

Viola’s mother had not mentioned their 
names to her in years. She did not believe 
in keeping up the acquaintance of poor rela- 
tions, especially country people. She could not 


At the Seashore. 


19 


endure their awkward ways and unkempt man- 
ners; besides, if you kept in touch with them 
they were liable to come upon you in the midst 
of some fashionable fete, and spoil all of your 
pleasure. 

They might be so forward as to come down 
to Viola’s wedding, when they heard about 
it, and what would Sinclair think, if she per- 
mitted it, of such commonplace relations. 

No, she would run no such risk. They were 
so far away he would never know of their ex- 
istence, and she hoped Viola would in time for- 
get them. 

But Viola could not forget so easily. She 
remembered their kindness in former years, 
how her heart, longing for some one to bestow 
its affection upon, had gone out to them; and 
to their home she would flee if it came to the 
worst. 

Viola was revolving the question in her 
mind, her face flushed with anger, and the 
woman in her fury was something dif- 
ferent from the calm Viola who appeared at 
tea time in lavender silk and white lace. 


20 


Viola Livingstone. 


“He shall not know that I suffer,” she said. 
“If I die I mean to die game.” 

“As I went to take her hand to-night,” said 
Sinclair, “she actually repulsed me. When 
she’s my lady. I’ll show her who is master.” 


Viola at Home. 


21 


CHAPTER III. 

VIOLA AT HOME. 

Viola's was one of the most luxurious 
homes in upper Fifth avenue. Her father, a 
prosperous broker, had died several years be- 
fore the opening of our story and left his 
widow and daughter in affluent circumstances. 

The former had donned widow’s weeds and 
wept copiously, but the fountain of her tears 
had about dried up when Lord Sinclair ap- 
peared upon the scene. 

“How fortunate,” said she, “that I am over 
my trouble, for young men do not like to visit 
a house where people are in trouble.” 

And what reason had Viola for disliking 
him? He was politeness itself, and could con- 
verse as fluently as any one in her set. We, all 
of us, meet people in the course of our lives 


22 


Viola Livingstone. 


that we dislike from the outset. I suppose it is 
from intuition, and so perhaps it was in Sin- 
clair’s case. 

She had persuaded her mother when sum- 
mer came to take her to the seashore, not think- 
ing that he would have the audacity to accom- 
pany her without an invitation from herself. 

He was boldness itself. Surely if that is 
anything in his favor he will win her. 

He had determined to make New York his 
home for the present, and was prominent at 
all the balls and soirees during the winter. 

‘‘Mademoiselle is a lovely dancer,” he said 
to Viola, “so graceful, so ethereal, she hardly 
seems to touch the floor; so spirituelle that I 
am afraid to lose my hold of her, lest she 
should disappear altogether,” while to himself 
he remarked, “When I find a golden bird I 
mean to capture it. Of course it may not be 
willing, but what’s the odds; the music is just 
the same, and any one is willing to sing to the 
tune of two million dollars any day, and I hear 
that is what she is worth.” 

The winter’s campaign was a very brilliant 


Viola at Home. 


23 


one. There were debutantes, and those about 
taking leave of life's stage, a conglomeration 
of wealth and beauty, belles and beaux, like 
the shaking up of numbers in a box, seeing 
who would draw the prize. 

But the race is not always to the swift, nor 
the battle to the strong — ^^so Lord Sinclair 
found out. 

Could any one so beautiful as Viola appear 
without causing a buzz of admiration? She 
was the center of attraction, and she sparkled 
and dazzled all around her. Place a diamond 
among a lot of opaque bodies, and will it not 
illumine them? The undue excitement that 
Viola was undergoing, owing to Lord Sin- 
clair's attentions, made her more willing to re- 
ceive the attentions of other men. 

‘Tt is singular," he said, ^‘how many men 
Viola knows." 

It was because her father had been so widely 
known in business circles. 

Shall we say the fire of jealousy burned in 
Lord Sinclair's breast? We never appreciate 
anything so much as when other people begin 


24 


Viola Livingstone. 


to do so, and now her beauty maddened him. 
He would crush her before he would see her 
the wife of another. 

Viola was out of her element when she was 
away with him during the summer; now she 
was in her element. Men of culture, breeding 
— intellectual kings — were her companions, 
and Viola’s wit sparkled and shone as foam 
upon a goblet. 

"M never knew the woman was so smart,” 
Lord Sinclair said, ‘‘but she shall not be too 
smart for me.” 

When he was married to her he would take 
her down a peg or two. Then he would have 
his revenge, if not before. 

How dare these ordinary people step in be- 
tween him and the gold he coveted. And he 
found Viola’s mother a willing accomplice. If 
she could ally herself anyway to a lord she was 
going to do so, so she would force him into 
Viola’s company at times when she was not 
aware of his presence. 

“It will be so high sounding,” she said, “to 
be called Lady Sinclair’s mother. What harm 


Viola at Home. 


25 


if I tell a few lies in rising to the station. 
Viola is surely drooping. She seems so de- 
pressed. It is all for want of a proper appre- 
ciation of her future station. To think of 
moving among the nobility of England and 
Germany is enough to make any girl look 
anxious. But after the marriage and bridal 
trip are over, she will revive like some sweet 
flower that has been scorched by too much sun. 
She will enter into their enjoyments as one of 
them, and I, of course, will be treated with the 
greatest respect and deference. 

‘‘No, I cannot let this chance go over. It 
is like flying in the face of Providence. Lord 
Sinclair has come all the way from Britain to 
find a bride, and no more beautiful woman 
lives in either continent than Viola. She is 
so like me when I was young,'' and if pink 
cheeks, scarlet lips and a white skin are any 
indications she had renewed her youth. 

‘Tf Viola sticks to it and refuses him I shall 
try to get him myself," she said. 

‘T suppose you intend to keep him in the 
family, like some old heirloom or relic," said 


26 Viola Livingstone. 

Viola, sarcastically, who had entered the room 
unawares. 

‘‘Do not make a fool of yourself,’’ said the 
mother, turning upon her. ‘‘Any girl in New 
York would jump at the chance, but you seem 
to have lost your wits.” 

“I must look to my heart for the answer, 
mother, and my heart always says ‘nay’ !” 

“If your heart were right it would say 
‘yes,’ ” said the ambitious mother. 

When Sinclair called that evening Viola’s 
cheeks were as red as two damask roses. 

If Sinclair has any heart at all he will 
surely fall in love with the woman to-night; 
he will let go of all mercenary motives and 
worship at her feet. The excitement of the 
day has made her intensely beautiful, as her 
mother’s words of the afternoon still rang in 
her ears as an unsavory message. 


At the Opera. 


27 


CHAPTER IV. 

\ 

AT THE OPERA. 

In the course of the evening Lord Sinclair 
said: 

“Mademoiselle, Patti will sing to-morrow 
night, and I want mademoiselle to accompany 
me. She is a lovely singer, and it will be like 
soul answering soul for mademoiselle to hear 
her. I remember,” he said, “how lovely mad- 
emoiselle used to sing at the seashore, until 
the waves caught the melody and added a 
sweet refrain.” 

When she departed for the concert the fol- 
lowing evening, her mother said : 

“You look your best, Viola. Lord Sinclair is 
sure to ask you to-night to become his wife. 
If you accept him you have my blessing; if 
not, my curse shall fall on you for life.’* 


28 


Viola Livingstone. 


Viola thought how dreadful her mother 
looked as she uttered these words. A mother's 
curse is something dreadful to fall upon you, 
even though that mother has been selfish, 
worldly minded, always seeking some emolu- 
ment of the flesh. 

Viola was the very hope she built upon. 
Fair as adamant or crystal, Mrs. Livingstone 
would let her barter her soul for a title, but 
she must save herself, and to-night the oppor- 
tunity would be hers. She would go 
with Lord Sinclair, but she would not 
stay to see the opera over. She would 
feign illness, and so get home early and 
gain time. A violent headache was sufficient 
excuse for her to be brought home an hour 
earlier, and indeed her head ached as well as 
her heart. Her mother would suspect noth- 
ing, would think she was in the company of 
Sinclair. 

And so the mother went to sleep and dreamed 
he was her son-in-law, and that a coronet 
rested on her own head. Alas! her golden 


At the Opera. 


29 


dreams, like many another’s, came to naught, 
for when she awoke in the morning she had 
no son-in-law and was also minus her daugh- 
ter. 


Viola Livingstone. 


30 


CHAPTER V. 

VIOLA TAKES FLIGHT. 

“Viola is taking a long sleep,” said her 
mother, “and it will do her good, for I am 
sure that her fate was decided last night.” 

Alas ! it was decided, but in a very different 
way from what her mother supposed. In- 
stead of dreaming of diamonds and the glitter- 
ing gems that make up all the light that some 
poor creatures in the upper stations have, she 
was borne as a waif on the tide of humanity — 
whither ? 

Ah! it is dreadful to be out in the world 
without a destination. She had bribed the 
coachman, and he had taken her to the sta- 
tion immediately after Sinclair’s departure. 

Her uncle and aunt, living in Vermont, had 
worshiped Viola in her childhood, until her 


Viola Takes Flight. 31 

mother had by her frivolousness driven them 
from her, and they had gone to the Green 
Mountain State. 

Simple in their tastes, nature always looked 
to them more inviting than art. What is art 
but an imitation of nature ? If there never had 
been any nature there never would have been 
any art. So they clung to the original as the 
handiwork of God. 

Thither Viola was tending, as she sped on 
her way like some nestling driven from its 
nest. She fluttered and trembled, but there 
was a purpose in her heart as immovable as 
the heavens. That purpose was to get rid of 
Lord Sinclair, with all his debauchery, all his 
chicanery, and his love of money. 

All his machinations would come to naught, 
as far as she was the object of them. Her in- 
nocence, that had never been tarnished in any 
way till her contact with Sinclair, was now 
polished and brightly shining again, like we 
may for a while be enveloped in a cloud, but 
when we come out of it the world looks 
brighter than ever. 


32 


Viola Livingstone. 


So it was with Viola. She had left New 
York, shaken off the dust of that city, and was 
being whirled like a madwoman on the earth 
and through the air, trying to get rid of that 
cruel word, fate. 

Why had she been environed by such a cruel 
fate? With a designing mother and a more 
designing lover, one striving for a name, the 
other for a fortune, had not her life fallen in 
hard places ? 

On, on she went, and the farther she got 
from Sinclair the lighter seemed her burden. 
Like Pilgrim, she dropped a fearful weight 
when she dropped him. She was fast getting 
out of the slough of despond and into the clear 
light of heaven. 

The fields seemed dressed in holiday attire. 
The winter had been a mild one, the green- 
ness of the preceding summer had not alto- 
gether vanished, and Viola thought it was like 
her heart. Even Sinclair could not kill all the 
greenness in her heart, for with the first pure 
breath of heaven it revived and the flowers of 


Viola Takes Flight. 33 

hope and contentment were beginning to bud 
anew. 

Did her heart accuse her for the step she 
had taken? Never. 

Lord Sinclair sat in his den, the smoke curl- 
ing up around him in blue wreaths. A surly 
smile was on his lip. 

“So the bird has flown,” he said, “to realms 
unknown. Why did I not clip her wings of 
pride, of scorn, of hatred for me ? Her mother, 
too, must be a donkey to let her slip through 
her fingers so easily. Young women now know 
more than their grandmothers. They lay out 
plans, and carry them out in dead of night. 
But where has she gone? Her mother says 
she has no relatives, and in her estimation 
every one to be noticed must be rich.” 

Viola had come and gone like an angel, and 
let us add, her mother was almost superstitious 
enough to think her dead. 


34 


Viola Livingstone. 


' CHAPTER VI. 

UNCLE WALTER AND AUNT META. 

Viola was welcomed at her new home, as 
the first spring flower is welcomed. Every one 
wanted her for himself. Aunt Meta said: 

‘‘Dear ! dear ! You came so far to see us all 
because a man wanted you you didn't want. 
After all," with a sly glance at Uncle Walter, 
“the men are of some account. Who can tell 
what they will do next, scaring beautiful 
women away from their homes. But you are 
welcome, dear. Your eyes are as blue as the 
bluebells that grow in the field yonder, which 
I dare say you will be picking before long. 
No roses are redder than your cheeks, and 
your hair is like dead gold, a crinkled, wavy 
mass. And so a man scared you away, so the 
men are come use," with another side glance at 


Uncle Walter and Aunt Meta. 35 

Uncle Walter, "and you ran straight into Aunt 
Meta’s arms.” 

Love shall be the cordial now to bring you 
to yourself again — the love of two warm 
hearts, flowing on like a calm stream in sum- 
mer, never varying from its course. 

Walter Livingstone was a well-to-do farm- 
er, who lived just out of the city of Brattle- 
boro, Vermont. He and his wife, Meta, were 
known for miles around as the most benevo- 
lent couple in the country. Childless, they had 
plodded on after they had buried their little 
rosebud of a child, to unfold in a higher clime. 
Now Viola would fill the vacuum in their 
hearts and make them bloom anew. 

Viola almost felt that she had gotten into 
heaven. It was the next thing to it, she was 
free, at least her heart and body were. Her 
soul was pent up a little while longer till she 
could do some more good, perhaps make the 
world better by living in it. 

The heart is like the mercury in the ther- 
mometer: give it a chance, surround it by a 
warm and genial atmosphere, and it will rise 


36 


Viola Livingstone. 


to great heights, but take away this leavening 
power and down it sinks into the sand and 
mire. 

The air was beginning to be colored with 
the golden tint of spring. There was a kind of 
mellowness about the sunshine that made you 
love to have it fall upon you ; the sky was in- 
tensely, brightly blue. 

Viola enjoyed herself like a young lamb let 
loose from restraint. What wonder that she 
found comfort in the companionship of these 
two gentle creatures, and of nature, with which 
we are all linked. 

Who has not some memory that takes him 
back to nature as the first link, perhaps, that 
bound him to an invisible God? Can we read 
a book without having to some extent become 
acquainted with the author? So when we see 
this great book of nature, written by the hand 
of the Infinite, spread out before us in letters 
of green and gold and azure, are we not led 
from nature up to nature's God ? 

So Viola analyzed each petal of the flower, 
as if it were a message directly for her. ‘T 


Uncle Walter and Aunt Meta. 37 

love you,” if it had never been said to her be- 
fore was said to her now, and her heart flowed 
out in return. Viola’s especial delight was, as 
Aunt Meta prophesied, to gather wild flowers. 

“Cultivated flowers are,” said she, “like 
belles, they soon get passe, and one sates of 
them.” 

“The very lines in the wild flowers are nat- 
ural, not artificial. There is no attempt to 
make them grow this way or that, but they 
are swayed by their own sweet will, or by the 
free air of heaven. 

One day in her rambles she saw a rose grow- 
ing under a fence, struggling for life, but 
hardly being able to gain it. 

“How like my life,” she said; “held down 
by bars and bolts till I eluded them in one mo- 
ment, as in the twinkling of an eye. Love 
laughs at barriers, and so does unlove, I think.” 


38 


Viola Livingstone. 


CHAPTER VII. 

VIOLA TURNS ARTIST. 

The lovely summer days came on and 
wrapped the earth in a mass of emerald and 
bloom, and Viola with her pencil and sketch- 
book in hand tried to preserve the most beau- 
tiful part of it. 

The mountains, with their shifting tints of 
green and gold, and lavender ; the woods, once 
perhaps like an eastern jungle, now made hab- 
itable, where brightly hued birds flit in and 
out, singing their love songs ; the flowers scat- 
tered like stars of white and gold, purple and 
amethyst, upon the great bed of green that 
spans the earth ; the silver streams, that gurgle 
on through meadows ripe with flowers and 
fruit; the blue sky above that seemed to invite 


Viola Turns Artist. 


39 


all weary travelers to look up and find solace 
and peace. 

All this beautiful picture Viola painted in 
commemoration of her freedom, and of her 
emancipation from the thraldom of man. 

But, alas! go where you will, Viola, and 
you will find man there. He will follow you 
like the dew follows the night. Transplant the 
loveliest women to the poles, or the uttermost 
parts of the earth, and, lo ! man is there. He 
seems to be a part of woman’s being, and 
woman the fulfillment of his. 

The apple blossoms had come and gone, and 
fallen like pink and w'hite shells from the up- 
per sea, the roses’ breath had begun to be its 
sweetest, and it had penetrated into Viola’s 
innermost being. In fact, she was a new crea- 
ture, not born of fashion, or of the will of the 
world, but the divine will seemed to have en- 
tered into her, making her love the very small- 
est thing in God’s creation. Love and nature 
are as inseparably mixed as the air and sun- 
shine. Viola would wander for hours in this 


40 


Viola Livingstone. 


new Paradise, and wonder why Eve ate the 
apple, and was east out of the original one. 

That first Eden must have been a w’onderful 
sight, so very near the gate of heaven that the 
angels went in and out. No stain of sin with 
its reddening hue went over it. The flowers 
were white, as though they were just trans- 
planted from the heavenly garden, and streams 
flew by like nectar, where the fair Eve bathed 
only a little lower than the angels. 

One breath of sin had spoiled it all. The 
flowers had withered away, the streams had 
dried up, the trees had lost their verdure, and 
what was promised in the bud was never ful- 
filled in the flower. 

How much of this Eden is yet left in nature 
we have to imagine. Morally, of course, it is 
defective, and when moral blight comes, phys- 
ical blight follows. Our moral nature is the 
light by which our nature grows; so, of course, 
in proportion as that light is withdrawn will the 
physical nature be dull and defective. 

But Viola was glad it was as well with her 
as it was. 


Viola Turns Artist. 


41 


But would her mother seek her and compel 
her return? At any rate, she would make hay 
while the sun shone. Lord Sinclair’s face 
should not rise like a dark cloud between her 
and her present happiness. 


42 


Viola Livingstone. 


CHAPTER VIII. 

AUNT META AS A MOTHER. 

Aunt Meta was more than mother to her, 
and Viola’s cup of happiness was almost full. 
The very love that had been pent up in her 
heart for want of a worthy object to bestow 
it upon now had full sway. Uncle Walter 
said: 

“Viola has come to be a daughter to us in 
our old age,” and he stroked the bands of her 
golden hair with far more fondness than if she 
had been her weight in gold. “Heaven has 
sent her to us,” he said, “like a ray of sun- 
shine to lighten our downward pathway, and 
we will keep her,” 

“Yes,” said Aunt Meta, “her mother may 
advertise, and hunt for her all she has a mind 
to, but all we will have to say is that she is not 


Aunt Meta as a Mother. 


43 


a fit person to take care of her, and so she will 
not be allowed to reclaim her.'" 

All the while Viola was free as a bird or 
bee to go where she was a mind to. Every 
nook and corner for miles and miles around 
was explored, and she brought forth countless 
treasures, and so learned more of the Great 
Author, whose works are manifold. If she 
went into the woods He was there; His foot- 
prints were on the grassy meadows; if she 
looked up at the blue sky at night she saw His 
words written there in letters of silver. 

She had nothing now to do with the past. 
The future loomed up like some bright picture 
that she longed to get a better view of. What 
hopes did it hold for her that would be culmi- 
nated in the highest happiness. 

When the trees put forth their leaves then 
we say that summer is nigh. And her heart 
was so nigh bursting with buds that we are sure 
it is nearing the time of flower and fruit. 

Aunt Meta was her model. On her cheeks 
were the roses as fresh as in her youth. 

“Worry and care scare them away,’^ she 


44 


Viola Livingstone. 


said, ‘‘and I have not had much of either. I 
believe in being cheerful as long as there is 
anything left to lean upon. God has given us 
a good home, and these fields for an inheri- 
tance. Gold is something we never cared for,'' 
she said, “except the gold that lies yonder — 
the golden streets and the hearts of gold that 
are awaiting us." 

Viola came in just in time to hear this last 
remark, her arms loaded down with May treas- 
ures. 

“What wood nymph has wooed you to- 
day?" asked Aunt Meta. “Fancy, with his 
painted and brightly colored wings, has drawn 
you into his fairy bower and showered May 
flowers upon you, or has Love wooed you and 
given you some of his orange blossoms?" for 
so some of the white flowers seemed. “But I 
know you would prefer to be wooed by Fame, 
with its wreath of immortelles to do something 
so grand and beautiful that your name would 
be mentioned a hundred years from now, after 
you had crumbled into dust. I can see it in 
your eye, Viola, an unquenchable fire, that 


Aunt Meta as a Mother. 


45 


leaps up, and shines, and sparkles, like the vol- 
cano, and will never be satisfied till it has 
reached the sky.” 

So Viola’s thoughts went upward, and she 
would place her name on the highest scroll in 
the heavens, but would she carve it with the 
sculptor’s knife, paint it with the artist’s brush 
or write it with the author’s pen? 

There was a natural grace in everything she 
did, whether she walked, rode or played the 
piano. After all, perhaps music is her forte, 
that golden sound by which the soul’s melody 
travels — shall we call it inspiration? 

There have been inspired writers, inspired 
speakers; why not inspired musicians, whose 
touch is something more than earthly, and 
on the chords we rise up a degree or two higher 
in our lives. 

So Viola sat down and played, as if her soul 
were in her work, her cheeks as red as the wild 
roses, her eyes shining like two radiant stars, 
her hair thrown back from her face and falling 
over her shoulders like a golden veil. 

Are not love and youth and music associa- 


46 Viola Livingstone. 

ted? But where is the lover now to complete 
this beautiful picture? Surely you would think 
he would appear at the doorway, artist or 
hunter, in a rustic garb, his face bronzed with 
the reddish tints of the sun, never more to hunt 
if hunter; if artist, never more to need a sub- 
ject for his easel. 

But Viola had no thought of pleasing any 
one but Uncle Walter and Aunt Meta. She 
lived in a divine atmosphere. What need had 
she to seek or make acquaintances? She would 
bask in the sunshine like a happy child, and 
know no restraint. She was a part of nature, 
the very highest, loveliest part. 

The last thing created was man and woman, 
so shall they hold a dominant part over inani- 
mate nature, and nature shall be in subjection 
to them. What a pleasure to be in subjection 
to such a beautiful being as Viola, who would 
not harm the lowest of creatures ? 

How long we can live off of the sunshine, 
but when the night of sorrow comes how soon 
we droop and die, like some flowers that close 
their leaves at nightfall. 


Aunt Meta as a Mother. 


47 


Ah, Viola! You can no more do without 
love than the earth can do without the sun; 
both would be a barren waste. The star of her 
affinity had not yet risen, but it would yet loom 
up in the distance, revolutionizing her 
thoughts, feelings and actions. 

Stars have presaged wars, pestilence, fam- 
ine. Why should not the star of love bring 
hope and courage in its train? She had been 
reared in affluence, idolized by her father, who 
had looked upon her as more than human; in- 
dulged by her mother, who had put her in the 
matrimonial market, and thought to exchange 
her for a position. 

‘‘Position is everything,’’ said the mother. 
“Without position and a title, how are you bet- 
ter than the plebian that jostles you in the 
crowd, the nobody without a name or money?” 


48 


Viola Livingstone. 


CHAPTER IX. 

MRS. LIVINGSTONE PLANS TO FIND VIOLA. 

“So Viola has disappeared,” soliloquized 
the mother, “and I can no more get her value 
than I could replace one of the rich gems in the 
queen’s diadem.” 

She always looked at Viola as to how much 
she was worth, and what she would bring in 
return, matrimonially. “If she were a plain 
or ordinary looking woman she might disap- 
pear in the throng and never be found, but she 
is uncommon looking. Where did you ever 
see such hair, so golden, and yet with an au- 
burn tinge when the sun glints over it? Eyes 
like stars of blue, and yet that grow deeper and 
darker with every feeling and impulse, cheeks 
as red as wine, beside which wine is tasteless. 
And such lashes! — it makes you long to be 


Plans to Find Viola. 


49 


under the lash all the time; at least, so says 
Sinclair. I hope he is sincere, for after all 
Viola is my own flesh and blood. Wherever 
she goes she is sure to make a sensation ; she is 
sure to be sought after for her goodness alone. 
I hope her loveliness will not be a snare, and 
make her sacrifice herself to some one unwor- 
thy of her. I never thought that Viola would 
leave her home, and leave me in doubt as to her 
whereabouts. 

“But you can never account for the actions 
of a young woman in love. There is no more 
stability about them than a bee sipping honey. 
Now they are at the heart of one flower, now 
at another, but they all meet at the one great 
hive, home. So I suppose when Viola has 
sipped enough sweetness from the outside 
world she will return and make Sinclair happy 
for the remainder of his life. He will love her 
all the more for the short parting. 

“I intend to hunt all over the United States 
for her, and when I find her we will both re- 
joice over the one sheep that was lost. I will 
apply to all the agencies and have a diligent 


50 


Viola Livingstone. 


search made for her, and she shall not escape, 
even if I have to go in person after her.’’ 

The fond mother looked over a list of the 
names of her friends and acquaintances, and 
in the search found those of Uncle Walter and 
Aunt Meta, Brattleboro, Vermont. 

Viola had fondly written them down, for 
she loved to think of these two persons, who 
were really her own kin, her father’s flesh and 
blood. 

‘T will start north first,” said the mother, 
‘Tor I always believe in going upward when 
you can. It is well enough to go down hill 
when you can’t help yourself. Brattleboro, 
Vermont, is the most northern point on my list, 
and thither I will go first. What a first-rate 
place for a lovelorn maid to hide in the moun- 
tains! But you can never quench love; it is 
an unquenchable fire, consuming everything 
that comes between it and its object. So, 
Viola, you need not have hidden there, if there 
you have hidden, for love will find you out.” 

And so the mother laid plans to find her 
daughter. 


Plans to Find Viola. 51 

Lord Sinclair called that evening, which was 
just one month after Viola’s departure, and 
he coincided in the mother’s plans heartily. He 
either really loved Viola, or else he was anxious 
for her return as he would be if some one had 
absconded with some of his money. 

The very best thing to do with a woman 
who has gone off like that is to let her have her 
own way for a while, and when she is tired of 
reconnoitering to fetch her back and bring her 
to terms. 

‘‘Viola has the very grit I had,” said the 
mother. “When I was young I was the grit- 
tiest thing. My husband always proposed the 
opposite thing he wanted, and then I was sure 
to please him. , 

“And your contrariness lasts with your 
age,” thought Sinclair, who would have pro- 
posed beginning with some nearer point than 
Vermont. 

Intuition is often better than knowledge. 
Man does a thing when he knows it, woman 
when she believes it. 


52 


Viola Livingstone. 


CHAPTER X. 

AN UNPLEASANT MEETING. 

The purple pansies that fringed Aunt 
Meta’s walk nodded wisely to one another, as 
if something unusual was going to happen. 
The golden sun streamed down like melted 
amber. The sky was like a blue lake over- 
head, from which was reflected all the fair 
things on earth, but the fairest thing was 
Viola, with her uncovered head, the living 
reality of Uncle Walter and Aunt Meta’s 
dream. 

They had dreamed of such a beautiful being 
living down in New York, with its stifling air, 
and brick walls, trying to rise above the pesti- 
lential air outside, and in her home curbed by 
the hand of an ambitious, ill-guided mother, 
having the heart’s treasures bartered for a 
title, and then perhaps the title was not real. 


An Unpleasant Meeting. 


53 


The very germ of innocence in Viola had 
not been killed, and Aunt Meta meant to nur- 
ture it till she was repaid by the sweetly re- 
viving graces of the heart and mind. 

“She is now one of our own family,” said 
Uncle Walter, “and we will never part with 
her. The wonder is how we lived so long 
without her.” 

Ah ! even now some one is lurking near, un- 
seen, though real. An enemy has entered the 
camp, and may any moment take her prisoner. 
Beautiful women have been made prisoners be- 
fore to satisfy the lust and greed of wicked 
people. They have even been put out of the 
way altogether. But Viola’s mother did not 
want to do this. She wanted to put a fetter 
upon her, galling for all time. 

The latch clicks at the gate and an ominous 
shadow crosses the walk. The very clock stops 
and refuses to go, as it has done before in 
cases of death. 

Viola is in the meadow, her usual resort on 
these lovely days of azure fairness. 

Viola’s mother must have seen her, for, in- 


54 


Viola Livingstone. 


stead of entering the house, she retraces her 
steps and crosses the velvet patch of ground 
between the house and meadow. 

But Viola would not have been so startled 
by the apparition of her mother if close behind 
her had not lurked the unwelcome form of Sin- 
clair. 

'‘Well, Viola,” said the mother, “have you 
had a good vacation, and are you ready to 
come home? See what love this man,” point- 
ing to Sinclair, “has for you that he could 
come such a long distance after you.” 

But Viola wished his love had not reached 
so far. She was satisfied with her life as it 
was. She had come so far to gain freedom, 
and she W’as no more willing to give it up to a 
Britisher than the old New Englanders in 
Revolutionary days of surrendering to the 
English. 

When she could keep the enemy at bay it 
was well enough, but when she was brought 
face to face with him she would either have to 
fight or resort to some stratagem to get rid of 
him. 


An Unpleasant Meeting. 


55 


The field adjoining the one in which Viola 
was was dotted with daisies, and they spar- 
kled and shone till they looked like a mass of 
precious gems on an emerald background. Into 
this field Viola went, and of course Sinclair 
followed her. On, on, Viola went, Sinclair in 
her rear like a grim and ominous shadow, till 
they had reached nearly the end of this field, 
just outside of which was a small pond where 
the cattle drank. Beneath the velvety grass 
and almost hidden by it was as velvety an ob- 
ject. But Sinclair saw nothing. 

He was about to take Viola’s hand and press 
his suit, and perhaps thought these beautiful 
surroundings of nature favorable to it; but, 
alas , his dream was not yet to be realized, for 
with one bound the sleepy animal, a bull of no 
small dimensions, rose from his lair and rushed 
toward him like a wild animal that has sought 
and just found prey. Whether because he was 
a stranger, or on account of his red hair and 
beard, not to mention his red face, was the 
cause of the animal’s showing fight, we do not 
know. At any rate, he plunged and foamed 


56 Viola Livingstone. 

and dived; his horns seemed to bristle up to 
twice their size. 

Lord Sinclair’s size greatly impeded his 
progress, so the bull had full play. He tossed 
him up and rolled him over like an India rub- 
ber ball. His clothes and linen were sadly de- 
moralized, as well as himself. He swore and 
raved, and in the midst of his bloody and di- 
lapidated condition Uncle Walter and Aunt 
Meta appeared on the scene with Viola’s moth- 
er, who had gone to the house, ostensibly to 
leave the lovers together and to make up, really 
to see what plan she could arrive at with the 
old folks about bringing her daughter home. 

As these three appeared the bull seemed to 
make one final lunge, fastened his horns into 
his victim and threw him over the fence into 
the pond, the blood streaming from face and 
hands. 

“I have never seen,” said Uncle Walter, “a 
bull and a jackass get into a fight without the 
bull taking all the conceit out of the jackass.” 
And Lord Sinclair’s pride had a great fall. 

Viola stood a ways off, convulsed with 


An Unpleasant Meeting. 57 

laughter. Surely thus far she had had her re- 
venge. He managed to crawl out of the water, 
though he was in a terrible predicament. His 
love for the time being was cooled. What 
would he have given now to have avoided 
Viola’s eyes? His clothes were dripping with 
water, and if Viola had had her kodak with 
her she would have taken his picture. 

‘‘Now,” said Uncle Walter, who had gone 
to the house and procured his shotgun, and, 
pointing it at him, “leave these premises, and 
never show yourself here again. We do not 
want any thieves here, and I hear you are 
looking for money that does not belong to 
you. So, now, make tracks.” And he made 
tracks truly, and Viola’s mother followed in 
his wake. 

“It is so wicked,” she said to Uncle Walter, 
“to treat a lord in this way. I am sure 
something dreadful will happen to you. Your 
house will be struck by lightning or you will 
lose your crops.” 

“I am sure getting rid of such a fellow as 


58 


Viola Livingstone. 


this ought to be followed by a blessing rather 
than a misfortune/’ said he drily. 

‘‘As for Viola, I will have her shut up in a 
nunnery, where she will be shorn of her golden 
locks as well as her wicked ways.” 

‘‘Not while I have a hand to prevent it,” said 
Uncle Walter fondly, caressing her golden 
hair. “I intend to keep her with me. We 
love her and she loves us, and we don’t intend 
to part with her under any circumstances.” 

The mother saw it was useless to argue with 
the man in his present mood. 

The whole neighborhood turned out en 
masse, and when they saw Uncle Walter with 
his gun they were enraged, for they thought 
something dreadful had happened. 

Now the bedraggled form of Lord Sinclair 
came up, and, “Lynch him!” “Ride him on a 
rail I” “Duck him !” were vociferously shout- 
ed, but when they saw that he had already been 
ducked they desisted. But if the two had not 
got out of town when they did there is no 
knowing what might have happened. 

As it was, Lord Sinclair felt very uncomfort- 


An Unpleasant Meeting. 


59 


able for a long time. Though his ardor was 
dampened, his miserly instincts were as active 
as ever. You would have thought the money 
had slipped through his fingers as well as the 
girl. 


6o 


Viola Livingstone. 


CHAPTER XI. 

MRS. LIVINGSTONE OFFERS CONSOLATION. 

The mother solaced him as best she could, 
but it was cold comfort, having a suit of wet 
clothes clinging to you. 

‘T am sure Viola is heart free,” said the 
mother; ‘^and as soon as I can get her away 
from her present surroundings everything will 
be all right again. Do you think I am going 
to be fooled by an old idiot in his dotage? As 
soon as I put the law upon him he will squirm 
and cry for mercy. That is the reason I left 
Viola there to-day* It is that I may have my 
revenge. Nobody ever went against me but 
they were hurt in the rebound. I will sue him 
for abduction. Viola shall come back to New 
York and shine brighter than ever. I will put 
an end to this hypnotism. I will let poor peo- 


Offers Consolation. 


6i 

pie know their place, and not have them med- 
dling with rich people's affairs." 

But Sinclair was miserable and refused to 
be comforted. His wet clothes clung to him, 
as a reminder of his folly, and he would gladly 
have changed places with some commoner man 
for the time being. 

Viola's mother was a wonderful woman. 
She conjured up all sorts of bright pictures, 
and painted fancy till it seemed reality. She 
made the central figure in this drama forget 
his grief in his flights on fancy's wing. When 
he and Viola were married what a sensation it 
would create in society's upper kingdom ! He 
for his nobility, Viola for her money and beau- 
ty. 

‘‘American girls," said she, “are the sweet- 
est; they have nature to feed upon. Art has 
not got such a hold upon them. They are not 
held down by rules and forms." 

“I have just had an exhibition of it," said 
he, “that this is a land of freedom — freedom 
of speech, freedom of action, freedom of 
thought and will. Viola is a statue of liberty 


62 


Viola Livingstone. 


herself, as beautiful, and you could move a 
statue as soon” 

“I never saw anything I could not move,’' 
said the mother. “I shall not leave a stone un- 
turned till I have accomplished my purpose, 
though it shall be done in a decent and orderly 
manner.” 

‘‘Was to-day’s ordeal a specimen,” said he, 
“of your way of doing things?” 

“True love never runs smooth,” said she. 
“There are ups and downs, sunshine and shad- 
ow, joy and sorrow, in the cup of all true love. 
It is like a stream that winds in and out, now 
through a mountainous road, or dark wood; 
now through a peaceful valley, lit with sun- 
shine and banked with flowers ; through fertile 
fields, ripe with the harvest; and through the 
barren waste, till it reaches the vast ocean; 
but it is the same stream all the time. So shall 
your love perhaps wind through all these dif- 
ferent paths, through thorny as well as rosy 
roads, till it reaches the great ocean of eternity, 
to be swallowed up in the mighty love of God.” 

So the woman had a poetical side as well as 


Offers Consolation. 


63 


her worldly wisdom, like one part of a garment 
may be finely woven, the other part rough and 
coarse in texture. 

Viola was an offshoot of her virtues not of 
her vices, for wjth all his cunning he felt that 
he had left a pearl behind him. 

‘‘What a beautiful gem for the crown of 
their old age,’^ said he, as he thought of the 
elderly couple who had possession of her. “Still 
. she is worth fighting for. Two million dollars 
would set off a young man’s crown deucedly 
well, I think.” 

His sordid nature was aroused again. It 
was like working for the money trying to get 
Viola to consent to the marriage. He shivered 
and shook like one with the tremens, but he 
was trying to abide by the advice of the woman 
beside him — to accept the plain as well as the 
gilt side of life. 

The purple sky had grown dark, and the 
night came on as a fit ending for. the day’s pro- 
ceedings. They would stop at some hotel and 
then he would have a chance to dry his cloth- 
ing and perhaps get his linen laundered. 


64 


Viola Livingstone. 


‘‘Women are equal to any emergency/' he 
said. “They can help you out of any scrape or 
get you into it. Who would have thought in 
that flowery field there was an animal lurking, 
ready to spring at you without any provoca- 
tion? Woman was, and still is, the temptress 
of mankind. She is beautiful and therefore she 
is dangerous. Viola shall not weave another 
net for me. I will turn the tables and weave a 
net for her, and when she is once in it she may 
beg for mercy, but I will know no mercy. If 
I once get her I will break her in as I would a 
skittish colt, with bit and bridle. I will see if 
she will be running away to the Green Moun- 
tains at her leisure. I wonder what plan the 
old lady will devise to get her back again. She 
is equal to anything, even to dealing with the 
“old fellow" himself. The money is safer in her 
hands, and all the time it is drawing interest. 
Mademoiselle is young, and beauty like hers 
never fades. It is of the indelible kind." 


Viola Develops Rare Traits. 65 


CHAPTER XII. 

VIOLA DEVELOPS RARE TRAITS OF CHARACTER. 

Meanwhile Viola was waiting for the de- 
nouement of the affair with a fluttering heart. 
Perfectly happy where she was, she did not 
wish to be disturbed. A perfect nest, where 
innocence might sit and brood and sing its love 
songs to itself. She did not wish to share such 
a life with a man she knew so little of as she 
did of Sinclair. 

A life that you have to keep all the time pol- 
ishing and brightening the surface must be 
made of some poor material. 

Why was he so anxious to secure her when 
she was opposed to him? Was it not some 
mercenary motive? He offered a name in 
place of her money. Would it not be a business 
arrangement after all if she should enter into 


66 


Viola Livingstone. 


any such agreement, which she had no inten- 
tion of doing? Her freedom of the past few 
months had strengthened this idea. Restraint 
was to her an irksome word, for it had always 
savored of injustice. 

Put a pure person under the command of a 
wordly one, and the pure person must always 
suffer. To yield is their nature. 

But, after all, Viola had a trait in her char- 
acter that would make her rebel when the time 
came. That time had come. With her free- 
dom her spirits had risen; there was an elas- 
ticity about her frame, her heart seemed to beat 
and bound as though possessed of new life 
blood. The poison had been taken out of it. 

A rare plant of any kind may not bloom in 
a poor soil, but transplant it to a good soil and 
the flowers immediately appear. 

So it was with Viola’s heart. It now blos- 
somed as the rose. The flowers of hope, joy, 
love, contentment, that had been kept in a chrys- 
alis state, now burst forth in all their splendor, 
with their bright colors and scented leaves. 

Uncle Walter and Aunt Meta watched her 


Viola Develops Rare Traits. 67 

through this state of graduation with a tender 
eye. They would give up their home, their 
fortune, but they would never give up this one 
woman in ten thousand. They would have to 
go away and leave their home, their gold 
would tarnish, but the beauty of the soul en- 
dures forever. 


68 


Viola Livingstone. 


CHAPTER XIII. 

LORD SINCLAIR AND MRS. LIVINGSTONE GET 
BACK TO NEW YORK. 

Viola’s mother and Sinclair had got back to 
New York. 

‘'Viola need not consider herself free from 
my authority and discipline,” said the mother. 
‘T have no intention of letting those two old 
people ride over and outwit me. I will apply 
to the authorities and proceed with the proper 
means of her restoration to home. She is a 
minor, and therefore I have a perfect right to 
claim her. The officers of the law will have no 
tomfoolery or dillydallying. I tell you these 
common people would be the ruination of good 
society, plundering, kidnapping, holding a 
person’s friends for the sake of a reward, which 
they shall never receive. On the contrary, I 


Back to New York. 


69 


intend to make them pay if it takes their home. 
If I could I would wipe them off of the face 
of the earth. Viola shall not grow up with 
them and have their country manners instilled 
into her. What ! Am I to lose all her training 
and education? Why, the thing is preposter- 
ous r 

She consulted Sinclair as to what plan she 
should pursue, but his advice, after the recep- 
tion she had given him, was to let her alone. ' 

‘‘If you let her alone she will come home of 
her own accord when the novelty of the situa- 
tion has worn off, but try to drive her and she 
will be like some contrary animal and be sure 
to go in an opposite direction. Women like 
above all things to have their own way. She 
is the guide and leader of man, say what you 
will. Talk of the woman being in subjection. 
It is the man. She speaks and he obeys. Her 
beauty, her loveliness, act like magic, and her 
will is done.’’ 

Viola’s mother thought : 

“If he is willing to give her up so easily I 
am not willing to give him up. Am I to strug- 


70 


Viola Livingstone. 


gle all my life for a name, and then give up 
the pursuit when it is about to be conferred 
upon me, or my daughter, which amounts to 
the same thing. Of course I will share with 
her the honors of foreign society and travel. 
It will be like the old story of Ruth and Na- 
omi, ‘Where thou goest I will go, where thou 
lodgest I will lodge, and there will I be 
buried.’ ” 

Lord Sinclair was willing to agree with her 
as far as the burying was concerned. 

“Women,” said he, “are like some kind of 
fruit. Some are sour, some are sweet, some 
are pleasant to the eye and taste, some fall into 
your mouth if you but touch them, some are 
away out of your reach.” 

Why should such a pure star as Viola be 
followed by such a satellite, managing, ma- 
neuvering, striving to get into the upper strata, 
where dwell the select few ? 

All the while Viola was blooming like a 
peach blossom in flowery Vermont, with no 
more care than the gentle breezes that sighed 
in and out among the trees. Her sparkling 


Back to New York. 


71 


complexion owed its glow to the healthfulness 
of the atmosphere, the freedom of her heart 
beatings and the unceasing love of those 
around her. 

Where there is a decadence of love there is 
always a decadence of health. Love is a 
healthy little god, who bathes his wings at the 
fountain of perpetual youth and springtime. 

So Viola's face glowed with the very wine 
of youth. She began to be a conspicuous fig- 
ure at the church, and at all the church gath- 
erings, a very pearl stranded on their shores, 
from the sea of fashionable society. She 
played the church organ, and her music seemed 
to draw them out of themselves and up into a 
pure, serene atmosphere, exempt from daily 
toil and care. Many a rustic swain's heart beat 
faster to the rhythm of her music. She was 
cultivated — that was the reason. 

Cultivation makes all the difference in the 
world, from a cultivated field to a cultivated 
person. The former they understood very 
well. The pL ughing, the weeding, the sowing 
of seed ; but when it came to the breaking up 


72 


Viola Livingstone. 


of the heart, for the good seed to enter, the re- 
moval of the weeds of the world, the plough- 
ing and furrowing by the hand of God, of these 
they were ignorant. 

What had this beautiful creature to do with 
suffering? Nothing. She was a bright spot 
in their otherwise dull existence, the leaven 
we hope that is to leaven the whole lump. 

Many a man has married a woman for her 
good looks, but when we add to it learning it 
makes the gem of intrinsic value. 

New York society has lost a belle, Vermont 
society has gained a Christian and a noble 


woman. 


The Minister Falls in Love. 73 


CHAPTER XIV. 

THE MINISTER FALLS IN LOVE. 

The young minister’s heart ached beneath 
his waistcoat more than was caused by his min- 
isterial cares. He could ask a man to become 
a Christian, but he could never ask this lovely 
woman to share his humble lot. He would 
feel like a thief if he did. Perhaps he had 
heard of the story of how she had been bar- 
tered away for a title that was, perhaps, noth- 
ing more than tinsel; how her heart had re- 
volted at the idea of being a wife in name only. 

When a woman loves a man, whatever she 
does for him is but the outflowing of her heart 
into its natural channel, but when these little 
acts are forced the arteries become clogged by 
selfishness and prevent a free passage of love 
from heart to heart. 


74 


Viola Livingstone. 


Viola had no intention of entering into any 
such agreement. In fact, her heart was born 
for love, and she meant to nestle among the 
New England hills till she could meet with 
her ideal presence, one of nature’s noblemen, 
not with outward signs of a high sounding 
name and glittering baubles that perish with 
the using, but the hidden man of the heart. 

The trees were heavy with foliage and the 
plants bright with flowers. Viola lived among 
them. She loved the Author, and how could 
she be nearer to Him than by associating with 
His works? She inherited the sunshine and 
thrived under it. Her breath was as sweet as 
the roses, her complexion as fair as the lily, 
her eyes like twin violets. 

What lover could have stood unmoved be- 
fore her? Even Lord Sinclair’s heart of stone 
must have softened. What mother would seek 
to warp or cripple such a life? Would she 
continue to carry out her purpose of making 
her submit to Sinclair’s advances? 

We are never so cowardly as in the affairs 
of the heart. We may expose the body to dan- 


The Minister Falls in Love. 75 

ger, but when the heart is at stake we tremble 
and shake lest something may turn the tables 
against us. 

So Viola^s heart fluttered like leaves in a 
cyclone. And was it not a fit comparison to 
her mother’s wrath? She had paid her one 
visit, but would she escape from the second so 
easily? Her vindictive nature would never be 
satisfied till she got possession of Viola. She 
was like so much money that she wanted to 
speculate with that had escaped out of her 
hands, at least temporarily. 

She did not know what she had to deal with 
in the persons of Viola’s uncle and aunt. They 
were of the good New England stuff, that 
would never give in one iota to friend or foe 
when they were in the wrong. They descended 
from old pioneer stock that had fought for the 
starry flag, and they were well able to defend 
a woman’s honor and save a woman’s heart. 

The days had worn a heavenly aspect since 
Viola came, and were they to go back to the 
common routine of childlessness and unlove? 

^‘We never knew what living was before, 


76 


Viola Livingstone. 


and if the mother ever tries to wrest from us 
the mainspring of our lives/' for so they 
looked upon Viola, ‘Ve will defeat her," said 
Aunt Meta. 

‘^And we are well able to," said Uncle Wal- 
ter. ‘Wiola is not obliged to live with her 
mother when there is no congeniality between 
them." 

If these old people's actions were as forci- 
ble as their words the mother would never be 
avenged. 

“If it comes to the worst," said the old cou- 
ple, “we will take Viola to Europe. In foreign 
society and travel the past will be buried, the 
present one golden day of recreation, the future 
something to look forward to, brilliant with 
prospects and bright with hope and love. 
Where will the court beauties be when Viola 
is around ? They will have to hide their heads. 
They will find that their only beauty lies in 
their coronets." 

“We have money enough and to spare," said 
Uncle Walter. “We will have her learn paint- 
ing of some of the best masters in Europe. 


The Minister Falls in Love. 77 

She has a talent in that direction, and no know- 
ing what the result may be. We have only to 
sow th6 seed and wait for the harvest. Who 
would think to look at the barren ground that 
it would yield flower and fruit and golden 
grain? It is the action of the sun and rain 
and heat upon it. So when the sunshine of 
love, that has so long been denied her, shines 
into her heart we may expect paradoxical re- 
sults.” 

So while her mother and Sinclair were plan- 
ning for her discomfort, her uncle and aunt 
were planning for her happiness. She would 
never return to the living tomb, her former 
home; for, like the butterfly that has escaped 
from the chrysalis state and spread its gor- 
geous wings of purple and gold and scarlet, so 
was she content to bask in the sunshine of the 
present and let the dead past bury its dead. 
With the resurrection of hope she had become 
a new being, and from the brilliant, polished, 
sparkling Viola we would never know that she 
had been in the fossil state. 

A pure atmosphere is all that is needed to 


78 


Viola Livingstone. 


make a healthy being, physical or moral. Love 
sways human beings more than men will ad- 
mit. It is the key that unlocks the heart. It 
is the basis of all earthly happiness, the foun- 
dation of heaven. 

So, when the clouds had gone out of her 
sky, she could look straight into the face of 
God and know it was all His love that had 
brought about the result and raised up these 
two dear friends in time of trouble. 

What an outlook for her to go to Europe! 
The old world was something that she had 
never explored : the antiquities of art, statuary 
and sculpture, by those who have themselves 
moldered into clay ; paintings and drawings of 
the old school; hidden relics of literature and 
wisdom, covered with the dust of centuries. To 
what depths she might go in this intellectual sea 
and fish up extinct specimens, to satisfy her 
taste and feast upon ! Did ever girl have such 
a prospect? How much better it was than 
marrying a lord and looking through his eyes 
at everything, as she probably would had to 
have done. 


The Trio Set Sail For Europe. 79 


CHAPTER XV. 

THE TRIO SET SAIL FOR EUROPE. 

The sun was just bursting from its mighty 
tomb, and its rays glint over the water till it 
looks like a sea of glass where all the colors of 
the rainbow are commingled. The waters 
dance to the tune of Old Sol, and Viola’s heart 
beats time to it as she and her party step on 
board the “Cymric,” bound for Europe. The 
old couple look as happy as two young people 
on their first voyage. Viola has been a sort 
of youth renewer to them. A look into her 
violet eyes seemed to bring back all the spring- 
time of their youth, as well as the golden mid- 
summer of their days. 

“If Viola’s mother goes to look for her again 
in our home,” said they, “she will find the nest 
empty, and the bird will have flown so far 


8o Viola Livingstone. 

away they will never be able to locate her. 
First we will be at this town, then at that, for 
I intend Viola to see everything there is to see, 
and it will be like our second sight, everything 
will be so fresh and beautiful to us. I have 
heard that people might hide away in London 
and be as free from discovery as though they 
did not exist.’' 

So to London they went, and truly there 
were people enough to hide away amongst, if 
that was all. People were hurrying along in 
such crowds that all Viola could think of was 
bees hurrying to their hives, loaded with sweet- 
ness or with sorrow. 

But it was now like the dawning of day to 
Viola. To be free, to be allowed to go where 
she liked, to not be under the surveillance of 
her mother or Sinclair, was joy enough. Pros- 
perous winds had wafted them across the 
ocean, and in the midst of it Viola was owner 
of all she surveyed. She had no one claiming 
this or that, and when land hove in sight she 
hoped it would prove an asylum for her grief 
and a refuge from her fears. 


The Trio Set Sail For Europe. 8i 

Here she would find an outlet for her genius 
that had been pent up like a river. The rain- 
bow-hued sunsets would find their way upon 
paper as sure as they were painted on the sky. 
The cathedral-like hills and grotesque valleys 
would be immortalized, so that the song of 
their praises would never die. The lovely face 
of nature must be photographed as it was, with 
its rivers like mirrors of crystal on an emerald 
surface and the trees and rocks that kept guard 
over all this beautiful scene. All this imagery 
of nature would live forever in her breast as 
well as on canvas. Love never dies, and who 
so great a lover of nature as she ? Perhaps the 
great lov^ that in other natures is transferred 
to man she gave to nature, knowing it would 
ever give back a return. 

Perhaps in her wanderings she would tread 
in the footprints of a Milton or Byron, and who 
more worthy than she ? Poets are always lov- 
ers of nature, for how can you write of any- 
thing unless you love it, and what poet has not 
made nature his theme from time immemorial ? 
It is old, but ever new. 


82 


Viola Livingstone. 


After they had done London they would go 
to Paris, the land of beauty, where the women 
are so well formed their clothes always fit 
them; where, after she had been stored with 
knowledge, she would do the polishing and 
brightening up. It would be like adding the 
frosting to a pudding, this adding the orna- 
ments to her person, after she was well dressed 
down with facts. And perhaps in their airy 
wanderings they would be wafted into Italy, 
the land of song, where every motion is poetry, 
every word musical. 


Is Music Her Forte? 


CHAPTER XVI. 

/ 

IS MUSIC HER FORTE? 

After all, who shall say that music is not 
her forte ? — that something that lifts us up 
from every-day realities, the link that binds 
us to another sphere. Without it how could 
we be any better than the animal ? With it, if 
we are not lifted into the company of angels, 
we can get a foretaste of what heaven must 
be. In Italy, where song flows like a river, 
she would lave and be baptized into member- 
ship with its fraternity. 

Where were skies so blue, where were sun- 
sets so gorgeous? The sun shone in the sky 
like a great jewel, till the waters of the Medi- 
terranean were tempered by it and the air 
made soft and genial. God seemed to have 
used the concentration of His power to make 


84 Viola Livingstone. 

everything shine and sparkle with undue splen- 
dor. 

Viola hoped He would use it upon her and 
make her what she wanted to be. And she 
was beautiful enough to fit all of these elegant 
surroundings. Her hair had added to it a 
bronze tint, a deeper rose flushed her cheek. 

‘Terhaps,’' said she, '‘this is the land flow- 
ing with milk and honey.’’ 

Here the wine seemed to flow naturally or 
with just a little pressing. Why should she 
not think it to be the New Jerusalem? 

But all this ground was not gone over in 
one year or two. It took longer than that to 
satisfy the inquiring mind of this fair scholar, 
born with a taste for everything grand, noble, 
elevating. Born with a gift, almost inspira- 
tion, for some great object in life, she will 
when that object is determined upon shake the 
very world of science to its center. 

Woman, who has never had her place in the 
mechanism of life, is fast filling up this niche 
or that, causing some wheel to move onward, 
being the motive power in this or that new en- 


Is Music Her Forte ? 


85 


terprise. Why should not woman, who is the 
author of all beings, have some part in the con- 
trolling power? What woman if put in office 
would pocket the funds of a bank? Not one 
out of a hundred thousand. 

Still, Viola had no aspirations for any pub- 
lic office, neither would she ever shine with 
borrowed light. Perhaps she had a certain 
longing for fame, that fadeless wreath of im- 
mortelles that survives even the tomb — to have 
your words repeated by other lips when you are 
cold and still. And there was a good streak in 
her nature. 

If a musician, she would by her sweet strains 
awaken others to a longing for a higher exist- 
ence. If an authoress, she would shine like a 
star of the first magnitude, to lead others on- 
ward and upward. 

Milton will never die, or Byron, or Cowper. 
They have passed on to another stage of exist- 
ence, but do we not hear them speak every day ? 

If an artist, will not her works follow her 
through all time? Putting beautiful pictures 
of this world on canvas, may not a little glory 


86 


Viola Livingstone. 


from the other immortalize them? So we let 
this beauty-loving soul roam on in imagination 
in pleasant places. What if she once in a while 
enters the clouds? She has passed the desert 
and entered the fertile valley that blossoms as 
the rose. What if she stoops to pluck one once 
in a while? For she can stoop as well as soar. 
So many a beautiful soul in disguise is raised 
up by her fair hand and transplanted in the 
heavenly garden. 

What other girls would have made a frolic 
of Viola turned to valuable account. She did 
not go to Europe simply for the purpose of say- 
ing she had been there, but she was bound to 
shine wherever she was. Her sky is now bright 
with promise. Uncle Walter hired the best 
masters to teach her, and they have the best 
material to work with, so we must expect glo- 
rious results. 

Music is to her the very breathings of her 
soul, and not a mere form gone through. In 
fact she digests music, and what would lie in 
other breasts a sodden, unassimilated mass, 
goes through every part of her moral being, 


Is Music Her Forte? 


87 


elevating, purifying, making a better woman 
of her. For is not music ennobling? In a music- 
loving nature are not the baser forms of man- 
hood subdued. It formed a golden cord be- 
tween her and Uncle Walter and Aunt Meta, 
binding them in closer union and sympathy. 
They would not part with their newfound 
treasure for all the mothers in the world, and 
Viola’s mother was a host in herself. 

She would teach the miserable beggars that 
had carried Viola off that they Had better con- 
sulted her. Ah! she forgot in the years she 
had disowned them that their fortunes had in- 
creased into a large sum. A rolling stone 
gathers no moss, and that had been her case. 
She must go every year to this or that fash- 
ionable resort, attired in the richest clothes, so 
the fortune her husband left her had no chance 
to increase, but had somwhat diminished, 
while Uncle Walter and Aunt Meta had stuck 
to the old homestead in Vermont, and it was 
green with the memory of the dear departed 
ones. And one day as they were growing old 
a vision had appeared to them of the loveliest 


88 


Viola Livingstone. 


woman in the world. She seemed to bring all 
sunshine and no clouds. 

Wise woman, she had left them behind her. 
In the case of Sinclair she had got rid of both 
shadow and substance. He was a coward at 
heart. He had once braved Viola’s wrath, and 
it had been too much for him. He would like 
to get possession of her, or rather of her for- 
tune, if he could do it without running the 
risk of personal danger. But he must leave it 
to a woman — woman who is so good at plan- 
ning — to play the game for him. 


Viola’s Flight Discovered, 89 


CHAPTER XVII. 
viola's flight discovered. 

Viola's mother had found out from good 
authority that Viola had fled the country, no 
doubt beguiled by her designing relatives. 

Ah! she did not know that love had been 
the spark that lit the flame between them. 
'Twas love that bore them over the blue ocean 
to a land of flower and song. The mother had 
never been able to reach her heart, that sanc- 
tum in which dwelt all the priceless virtues, 
better than rubies; but the old couple had as 
surely got possession of them as that they were 
there. Pride was the great stone at the door of 
her daughter’s heart, which, if the mother had 
rolled away, she would have beheld her in all 
her innocence and purity. Ambition was her 
god, to be something more than ordinary. 


90 


Viola Livingstone, 


While her mother and Sinclair were think- 
ing of the best means of assuaging their grief 
and of righting their wrongs Viola was watch- 
ing an Italian sunset. 

‘‘I hope that my life may go out like that/' 
she said, ‘Vith as much glory. Then I shall 
not dread the closing of life's day." 

The scarlet and amber, and gold, and pur- 
ple seemed to melt away into something 
brighter and better beyond. 

‘‘And that," said Viola, “must be heaven. 
The very gates of pearl turn crimson with its 
glory. What if the day has been stormy if 
at evening time there shall be light ? The sun 
dips into the sea till it changes it into a bed of 
crimson glass." 

Viola came so near being an artist she could 
not help admiring all these beautiful scenes in 
nature. The stars came out like angel's eyes, 
blinking and winking, to watch over her as 
long as she chose to sit there and enjoy this 
heavenly panorama. Music was the outlet of 
her soul, and such a soul always turns heaven- 
ward. 


Viola’s Flight Discovered. 91 

As the magnetic needle always points north- 
ward, so the Christian’s sight is always di- 
rected upward. No matter how beautiful the 
earth may be, though covered with a robe of 
velvet and dotted with gems from all parts of 
the floral kingdom, still it is but sparsely dec- 
orated, compared with the worlds He has sent 
forth to traverse space and speak of His infini- 
tude in a thousand different tongues. 

No wonder Viola never grew weary in 
studying the Great Author. Love was the sub- 
ject of every theme. Love had set all these 
jewels in the heavens from the foundation. 
She might read many a book by man on the 
heavens, but she could never get such a dis- 
sertation as this spread out before her by His 
own hand. 

Viola’s uncle and aunt expect to see her one 
of the leaders of the musical world before they 
die. She has led them into bright paths and 
pleasant places, and they are only waiting 
to see their queen crowned before their de- 
parture. Viola had gone on from one stage 
of progress to another, learning from the best 


92 


yiola Livingstone. 


masters in England, France, Germany and 
Italy. From one she got the principles of 
music, from another the touch, from another 
the taste, from another the melody. 

''Our bird shall be full fledged,’’ said Farmer 
Livingstone. 

Her mother had no more idea of her talents 
than she had of undiscovered gold. It was the 
same to her. Did she not keep her under, 
domineering over her, treading upon her heart- 
strings. But it is hard to kill the seeds of 
good. The woman that was in her would 
rise up above the false accusations of her 
mother. Like a ray of sunlight, born to give 
light, it was hard to put it out. Her mother 
had only seen her in the bud, but if she had 
seen her in the flower would she have recog- 
nized her own offspring? 

When her heart was closed, she had no one 
to open it to, but now all the sweet graces of 
her mind and soul had expanded with all the 
rich coloring that true friendship gives. Hers 
was no blighted life, spite of all her hindrances 
and reverses. Love will always do its perfect 


Viola’s Flight Discovered. 


93 


work. The love of these two old people had 
made her heart perpetually green, for there was 
no drouth of love with them. They had been 
father and mother to her. 


94 


Viola Livingstone. 


CHAPTER XVIIL 

MRS. LIVINGSTONE AND SINCLAIR FOLLOW 
VIOLA. 

But even now, fair maiden, a plot is brew- 
ing to sap your life of its joy, to rob you of 
your happiness. The mother has proposed, 
and Sinclair has accepted, a trip across the At- 
lantic. His greed is such that he would fol- 
low a woman with money around the world ; 
and the woman, for the sake of a name, would 
take a trip to the poles, or climb the Alps, and 
no doubt in either case she would gain one. 

Meanwhile Viola had grown to be a star 
of the first magnitude in the musical sky. It 
needed no opera glass or telescope to discover 
her. Would they not pick her out at once as 
the woman for whom they were looking? 
[Would not the mother claim her by right of 


Viola is Followed. 95 

kin, and try to force her into a marriage with 
Sinclair ? 

“I will make a ‘Lady’ of her,” said she, 
“before I take her home. I will teach her not 
to be running off with aged people of doubtful 
relations, without my consent.” 

Was this beautiful woman with all the bright 
plumage of a prima donna to be shorn of it 
in a night, and when she cried peace and safety, 
was sudden destruction to come upon her? 

Fear not, you are so far above them in a 
mental way they can never reach you. They 
may envy you, as they envy the angels’ flight, 
but they can never overtake it. 

What does a common mind care for the 
fairest picture, or the best production of art? 
Born to grovel, they are satisfied with the sen- 
sual pleasures of life. Place them in heaven 
and they would have no one to associate with. 
So this fair rose had been transplanted so far 
out of their reach that not even her perfume 
could reach them. 

Still, you say, the worm sometimes follows 
the flower and eats away its life and beauty. 


96 


Viola Livingstone. 


But love shall counteract it — the pure love of 
these two aged people. Like the ruby and 
golden sunset bespeaks a bright to-morrow, so 
her sun had set on her past life, leaving all 
storms behind. 

But her mother and Sinclair had one com- 
mendable trait — perseverance. They had come 
to look for her and they would do so till they 
found her. Like a lost gem of intrinsic value 
tossed up on some foreign shore, they would 
hunt for her with unabated zeal. 

Riches take wings and fly away. Truly, this 
had been the case with Viola’s. 

They boarded a White Star line steamer di- 
rect for Liverpool one golden May morning. 
The earth seemed to have donned her loveliest 
mantle in which to wish them godspeed. If 
Sinclair failed now he would be a ruined man. 
The very lips of Viola would ruin or save him. 
He had no doubt that the mother, who was so 
good at diplomacy, would carry out the scheme 
well, so into her hands he committed himself, 
while the whole ocean became one glittering 
shining mass of prospective gold. 


Viola is Followed. 


97 


A fortune hunter is never a desirable per- 
son. The very sweetness of love is lost in the 
desire for the actual. So while Sinclair is 
building castles whose foundations are money 
Mrs. Livingstone is laying plans of a different 
nature. Not but what money is in her estima- 
tion an essential element in worldly happiness. 
She thinks if she can bring about this marriage 
she can come in contact with some of the first 
families in Europe, the elite, the nobility. 

“Viola would be the very person,” said she, 
“to deck a crown. Her beauty and wit, in- 
herited from me, would dazzle and sparkle till 
all men would fall down and worship her. 
Perhaps her coming to Europe is just the thing 
to bring about this result. Sinclair says he 
is a near relative of the King of Germany, and 
who knows, if I can bring about this alliance, 
and we might call it a triple alliance” — for she 
always included herself in the bargain — “who 
knows but what a few generations from now 
some of our line may sit upon the throne. 
That would be well worth the money I have 


98 


Viola Livingstone. 


spent on him, and if I do not live to see it it 
will be a consolation to think of.’’ 

And to tell the truth the woman was never 
happier than when she was laying some grand 
scheme for her aggrandizement or future 
emolument. 

The ship sped on its way like a white winged 
messenger of love or hate, joy or sorrow, con- 
tent or misery. The foam was thrown out each 
side like a bridal trousseau, and the heavens 
seemed to smile upon it. The angry cloud had 
not yet risen from which the storm was to 
descend that would shake the ship to its cen- 
ter, and when it did come Viola’s mother was 
a frightened woman. She found that her 
house was built upon the sand, or upon some- 
thing less stable, and she was drifting hither 
and thither at the mercy of the waves, now 
mountain high, now almost buried beneath the 
briny deep. 

The conscience is the thermometer of the 
moral nature. If the conscience is right 
everything goes on evenly, not too hot or too 
cold. But we must say this woman’s con- 


Viola is Followed. 99 

science needed regulating, else she would not 
have quailed so under divine wrath. 

Even Viola, frail flower though she was, 
would have stood it all without a shudder. 
What grander scene for her artist mind than 
a storm at sea, where the giant waves leap up 
like snow-capped mountain crests, as if defy- 
ing the elements, or urging them on to greater 
fury, where there is nothing to ward off the 
storm, as the mountains and trees do on land, 
but where old ocean lashes himself and foams 
till he has exhausted his fury. In and out the 
lightning leaps and darts, like tongues of 
forked fire in which an angry God speaks his 
wrath, and the thunder seems like the death 
knell to frightened souls. But the after 
beauty, when the sun shines forth and trans- 
forms the drops of water into gems of all the 
colors of the rainbow, makes up for all the 
terror of the storm. 

So Viola, with her highly impressionable 
nature, would have regarded it. But her 
mother and Sinclair were cast in a different 


LofC. 


loo Viola Livingstone. 

mold, and if Viola hopes never to meet Sin- 
clair again it is no more than natural. 

But, alas for human expectations. Her 
uncle had been called back to London on ac- 
count of some home business, some property 
he was about to sell, and one evening as the 
trio were walking in one of the prominent 
art galleries who should meet them face to face 
but Sinclair. Had some of the pictures come 
to life and stepped out of their frames, their 
consternation could not have been greater. 
What ill wind had wafted him hither, and 
lo, behind him like a grim and omnious shadow 
Viola beheld her mother. 

Had the sea given up its dead, for had not 
Viola buried all thought of him when she came 
to the Old World? 

Viola would have brushed by them, but her 
mother was too quick for her. 

‘‘I thought I would find you here,” she said, 
‘‘for I knew your fondness for pictures and 
folderol. Now you can come back to the nat- 
ural and embrace me.” 

(She weighed well on into the hundreds.) 


Viola is Followed. 


lOI 


“And if you want to take pictures you can 
take one of your future husband,” was her 
mental comment. 

ButViola, instead of taking a picture of him 
would rather have all thoughts of him re- 
moved from her. 

Viola’s face was the most beautiful one in 
the art gallery. White as marble, her lovely 
profile shone with unearthly beauty, as she 
said: 

“Mother, I love you, but I cannot take this 
man into my heart, for I know that he is false. 
He is a fortune hunter, and his profligacy 
shows on every feature of his face. Would 
you barter your daughter for a name when 
that name is a stolen one, for he is no more a 
lord than Uncle Walter is, and not half as 
much. Of this I have inquired, and have ab- 
solute proof.” 


102 


Viola Livingstone. 


CHAPTER XrX. 

VIOLA CONFESSES HER LOVE. 

The next day, in conversing with her 
mother, Viola said: 

‘T love a young artist, Henry Vaughan, 
who has more in one inch of his head than all 
of Sinclair’s, which is so large it seems to be 
a waste of space. Henry paints flowers beau- 
tifully, and is fast winning a name in the 
world of art. Our tastes blend so together, 
is it not natural we should love each other?” 

Had the mother come so far to be converted, 
and did it take all of the water of the Atlantic 
to baptize her ? But her sins were many. How 
had her idol fallen, a broken bit of clay, and it 
lay shattered at her feet. 

How would Sinclair defend himself against 
the charges of Viola? Alas! like the coward 
he was he did not remain to defend himself. 


Viola Confesses Her Love. 103 

but went to ply his nefarious art in pastures 
new. He did not often have to deal with the 
bright girl Viola was. Sinclair unknown was 
a different person from Sinclair found out. 
Then he had the braggadocio of the coward; 
now the places that had known him knew him 
no more. He knew that Viola had the courage 
and power to have him dealt with by law. To 
elude her he fled to parts unknown. 

Love makes more difference in a person’s 
appearance that anything else in the world. 
Under its influence Viola grew beautiful like 
the flower grows in the bright sunshine. All 
the virtues of her mind expanded and blos- 
somed out, and her body was a perfect setting 
for such a soul. The liquid depths of her 
eyes were full of that wonderful light that is 
born only of inward satisfaction. 

She had been acting a part, and now she was 
her own natural self again. 

! The pearl that had been stranded on a for- 
eign shore was picked up as bright and shin- 
ing as ever, and that is always the beauty of 
the genuine article. No matter what its sur- 




104 Viola Livingstone. 

roundings are, to what depths of moral filth it 
may have been subjected, when seen it always 
shines the brighter from the contrast. 

Viola had tried to throw off the contami- 
nating influence of Sinclair, and so sought an 
asylum in the verdant hills of England, the 
flowering vales of France, and in Italy, where 
song bursts forth like the volcano, born of an 
mward fire. She hungered and thirsted for 
music and longed to be perfected in it. 

It seemed to her a part of heaven that had 
not been taken from us by the fall. 

She would study as she never had done be- 
fore, now that the one obstacle to her happi- 
ness was removed, and we soon see her a star 
of the first magnitude in the musical sky. She 
was fit to go upon the stage, but she would 
never go there, her modest nature shrinking 
from such a life. She could win honors 
enough in private circles and in her home, that 
sanctum where every virtue would be culti- 
vated, every grace nurtured, and when the 
home is attractive we do not have to seek out- 
side amusement to make us happy. 


Viola’s Wedding. 


105 


CHAPTER XX. 

V I O L a's wedding. 

Another year perfected Viola in the art of 
music. Travel had broadened her views and 
given her an insight into all the details of cul- 
ture and artistic merit. On the ripples of her 
music you were carried into a higher strata of 
thought and feeling, and on the golden sound 
you loved to linger, forgetful for the time be- 
ing of the dross and sensualism beneath. 

Perhaps her mother, too, is satisfied, know- 
ing that Viola has won a name all her own, not 
by marriage to lord or duke, but achieved by 
natural merit and careful study. 

Henry Vaughan is also fast achieving fame 
as an artist, his pictures are so truthful and 
lifelike. He painted Viola’s picture and after 
seeing it, Uncle Walter said : 


io6 Viola Livingstone. 

‘‘It almost speaks, and you feel like gather- 
ing the roses from cheek and lips, they are so 
fresh and natural/’ 

In this propitious atmosphere Mrs. Living- 
stone has obtained new views of life, and by 
her association with Viola has got an insight 
into the inner workings of her nature, the 
more of which she sees the more there is to 
admire. The superficial side of life was all 
that she had been wont to look at or rest upon. 
Now that structure had given way, and she 
must find something more substantial for her 
hopes and desires to rest upon. 

She found that kings and queens live in many 
a home without throne or coronet, their king- 
dom to do good to all within their reach. So 
Uncle Walter and Aunt Meta and Viola had 
risen in her estimation the longer she was in 
contact with them, and the more she saw of 
their beautiful lives the more she longed to be 
like them. 

The following spring the party returned to 
America, and two months afterward there was 
a grand wedding at Viola’s home. 


Viola’s Wedding. 


107 


Unde Walter gave away the bride, and his 
bridal gift, a necklace of pearls, was prized 
more highly by Viola than anything else she 
received, for had she not been sheltered by 
him when she had no place to go, and been 
saved from being sacrificed on the altar of 
mammon by his great love, as strong and pure 
as gold ? 


THE 

END. 




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